


Love is Blind, Deaf, and Walks with a Limp

by isaac richard (isaacrichard)



Category: House M.D.
Genre: Big Gay Love Story, Bittersweet Ending, Cancer, Canonical Character Death, Character Study, Doctors & Physicians, Established Relationship, Hospitals, M/M, Marriage, Season/Series 08, tags are really hard for this one man. shit
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-06-01
Updated: 2020-06-01
Packaged: 2021-03-02 19:20:29
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 3
Words: 5,017
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24481912
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/isaacrichard/pseuds/isaac%20richard
Summary: James Wilson is not afraid of death - but he is afraid of commitment.Greg House aims to make an honest man out of him before he goes.
Relationships: Greg House/James Wilson
Comments: 7
Kudos: 66





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> this fic takes place around... 2011ish. i have seen the entire series, but it has been a year or two, so excuse any discrepancies there (especially in the more minor characters. i know many of the ogs on house's team leave in the later seasons, i just didn't like the new guys haha) 
> 
> i can't believe the gay doctors got to me. again.  
> thanks for reading :)

James Wilson wasn’t afraid of death.

He wouldn’t have made his career in medicine, in _cancer,_ if he were. He routinely worked with the grim reaper over his shoulder, Its icy hands outstretched to whatever parent, child or loved one had weak enough genes to be susceptible to leukemia.

But it becomes so much more terrifying when it’s _you,_ he quickly realized. He had spent the better part of two decades overseeing chemotherapy treatments, but the moment they stuck the needle in his own arm, he had to claw into the faux-leather seat in an attempt not to head for the hills.

House had held his hand, the first time, ran his stupidly long pianist’s fingers across Wilson’s knuckles and thumb. He remembers that – and couldn’t forget it, either, because of how the chemo nurse gawked. Plainly said, House’s reputation preceded him, and she didn’t try to hide how absurd she found the great asshole Doctor House holding his boyfriend’s hand.

But House had just laughed and laughed, making Wilson feel better about the chemicals being pumped into his veins. And that was all that mattered. When House was around, it was like that – Wilson couldn’t be bothered to care about anything happening outside their little world.

What he was afraid of was the pain, he supposed. He understood his prognosis better than anybody else – they couldn’t sugarcoat it to him, the way doctors are prone to do. He understood what all the big words in his file meant. He was going to die, and it was going to hurt – up until the very end, when they’d give in and put him on the good stuff: the strong opioids they kept under lock and key.

Those were the facts, same as how the sky was blue. There was no changing it, so he’d made his peace with it.

No, he wasn’t particularly young, and his life hadn’t been particularly grand. A handful of divorces and a House – he had definitely known people with better streaks. But he had put good in the world. He had saved lives, several hundred of them if he wanted to quickly do some math, and that was enough for him to accept the rapidly approaching end. He wasn’t giving up. He was being realistic.

And sure, maybe he should take this time – the handful of months they had given him – to find God, or see the Grand Canyon, or whatever. Check some shit off the bucket list he never wrote. Maybe he should find the great meaning to his life, unlock the mystery to the queer little nerd from the poor part of Jersey, who had been married and divorced enough times to fill all five fingers with rings.

Or maybe he could just lay here, doing his crosswords and occasionally looking over at his own heart rate on the monitor. He could watch the shitty daytime television that he never had time for, eat a couple pudding cups while he still had his appetite. 

“Wilson!”

Or… not.

House barges in, then. He was the same as he always was, the same way he had been in all the years Wilson had known him. He was House. He was loud and crass and _rude,_ had less people skills than a walnut, and made his living in a profession that usually included a lot of talking to people – that is, if you didn’t work in a specialized department and routinely weasel your way out of clinic duty. He was a genius, and an idiot, and trouble followed him around like it didn’t have anything better to do.

And Wilson was in love with him, of course. Had been for six years or more. Through his many divorces, through House dating Cuddy, through all the drama that surrounded them like a low-hanging fog, House had been his one constant. The one person who always loved him back.

“Hi, House,” he says softly. “You should be working.” Only one of them was dying, after all. Life goes on.

House gasps, clutching his heart with the hand not grasped around his cane. The sliding door shuts behind him, and Wilson distinctly feels like he’s been trapped in a cage – like he was a lab rat, and a conversation with House was part of his maze.

“You allege that _I_ would skip out on clinic duty? You offend me, sir, as I take all parts of this job seriously…”

“Shut up,” Wilson murmurs, rolling his eyes. He hadn’t even _said_ the words ‘clinic duty’.

He pushes himself up in the hospital bed, very much hating how House watches him do it. House watches way too intensely, like he’s gonna fuck up simply sitting up in bed, or it’s going to give him a heart attack to do it. He watches like he’s preparing to jump in and save Wilson from himself.

His gaze doesn’t waver, even when Wilson petulantly stares back. “Did you eat? Or are you coming to pick-pocket the dying man?”

House ignores him. “Your digs suck,” he says, puttering around the small hospital room. He peeks out the window, where Wilson has a grade-A view of overflow parking. “They gave this to the head of oncology?”

“I’m just a patient, House,” Wilson says, long-suffering, as House's ego had yet to rub off on him. He picks at the medical tape around his IV, thinking about how he can’t wait to go home and shower. His admittance was just routine post-chemo – they were being careful, loading him up with saline for hydration. As soon as he had the okay, he could leave.

“Also, what luxury rooms could you possibly be referring to? I don’t know if you’ve noticed, but this is a teaching hospital. Not the Ritz.”

House makes an indignant sound. “I ate,” he says finally. “Reubens suck today, too.”

“Or maybe you’re just pissy,” Wilson observes, watching the way House moodily stalks around the room. He sighs. “Come sit, at least, if you’re not going back to the clinic. Your incessant hobbling gives me the heebie-jeebies.”

“Oh, fuck you,” House says, acting all hurt and offended, only to grab a chair and pull it up to Wilson’s bedside. He sets his cane against the wall, leaning onto Wilson’s bed with his head in both hands. He bats his stubby eyelashes.

“Hi, snookums.”

Wilson laughs, bats House’s stupid, handsome face away. “Why are you in a bad mood? You weren’t when I got checked in, right?”

“I’m always in a bad mood,” House mutters. He takes Wilson’s hand and gives it a squeeze.

Wilson frowns, looking down at where they’re linked atop the sheets. “That’s not true,” he says. “I distinctly remember about three days in 2004 when you were very happy.”

House snorts. “The three days I went to Vegas?”

“Was it?” Wilson asks. House is still holding his hand, their fingers linked like elementary schoolers. He gives House a little tug, attempting to make him smile. “2004 was the year you went? I was pulling that out of my ass.”

“I know,” House says, and he probably did. He didn’t know how to talk to people – but he knew how to read them, always. Countless lives had been saved because of House’s ability to call people on their shit. Everybody lies, et cetera.

There’s a long few seconds of silence, filled only with the soft beeping of machines, the muted chatter of hospital goings-on outside Wilson’s room. Somewhere down the hall, in room just like this one, someone is crying. For some reason, that’s what Wilson’s ears choose to focus on: the great, gasping sobs that fill him with sympathy. Hospitals could be worse than graveyards – but you didn’t need to work in one to know that.

“Are you okay, House?” Wilson asks softly. The irony of asking this from a hospital bed doesn’t escape either of them.

House is unsettlingly quiet. House is never, everquiet – even when he slept, he muttered bullshit through the night. Wilson has the earplugs to prove it.

“Greg?” Wilson very rarely pulled out the _first name_ card, okay, but this was weird. Why didn’t he just spit it out, whatever it was? Unless he had suddenly decided to pull the plug on their relationship, Wilson couldn’t imagine what he had to fear.

“I’m going to ask you a question,” House says. His gaze burns two holes into Wilson’s retinas, but he doesn’t dare look away. “And I want you to have an open mind. Okay?”

“What, are you going to say we open our relationship? Get a couple hookers in bed with us?” Wilson jokes, but it falls completely flat. He frowns, feeling the wrinkle in his brow. “Shit, what is it, House? What’s the deal?”

“Do you wanna get married?”

Wilson searches House’s face and makes the correct assumption that this isn’t a joke. He laughs anyway, startled, and frankly nervous. For all the times he’s proposed, he’s never been proposed _to._ And he's definitely never proposed from a hospital bed. 

“What?” he asks softly, and suddenly wonders if it’s even legal in this state.

“Do you want to marry me?” House asks again, enunciating slowly, like Wilson hadn’t understood the question.

“Yes,” Wilson says immediately, because he doesn’t want House to get the wrong idea. He loves him – he’s loved House for almost a decade, since the guy first met him and promptly decided the twerpy kid who knew a lot about cancer was his new best friend.

“But House – what the fuck? I’m gonna be dead in six months, and even if I wasn’t, I don’t exactly have the best track record with the institution of marriage.”

House knows this – and Wilson _knows_ House knows this. He had ceaselessly badgered him about his lack of commitment when one marriage after another fell through, teasing him endlessly about being a monogamist who couldn’t settle down. And now, he wanted to get hitched to _serial divorcee James Wilson_. It was enough to boggle the mind, certainly.

“Good, good,” House says casually. “You okay with a drive-by, or do I have to rent a tux?”

“ _House,”_ Wilson says gravely. “Come _on_.”

For a split second, Wilson sees the fear in House’s eyes. He looks like a deer in the headlights – one that’s wise enough to turn tail and run. He grabs House’s bicep, quickly, before he can limp away from everything he’s just laid on the table.

Then it dawns on him. _Holy shit, he thought I was going to say no._

That’s why the silence. That’s why the odd behavior. House had asked, even though he thought Wilson was going to shoot him down.

“Oh, House,” Wilson murmurs. He thinks, _you’re the biggest idiot I’ve ever loved._

“I’m not getting any younger,” House says. “You’re not getting any more alive. I figure… now or never, right?” The smile he shoots Wilson is downright pathetic, nothing more than an uptick in the wobbly line of his mouth.

“This matters to you, doesn’t it?” Wilson asks suddenly. He pokes House’s chest, smack-dab where his heart is. “Doesn’t it?” 

He’s pushing, here, and he knows it – but you sort of have to push, with House. Otherwise, you get the history of anemia and are still left wondering what the hell he meant. That convoluted, bullshitty way of talking was a work around, one House had nearly perfected over the years. You can’t make him tell you what you want to know, if you don’t know what he’s talking about.

House makes a gruff little noise. “Caring about things is for girls.”

Wilson wonders – and it’s hard not to, with all the years he’s been in House’s company – what made him such an emotionally stunted bastard. He knew House didn’t talk to his parents, but that was it. Wilson didn’t even know if they were still alive.

It really wasn’t hard to imagine a gangly, sarcastic, too-smart, teenaged House getting shoved in the halls, though. Wilson could relate – but he didn’t have the mouth House did, not now or then. Thank God.

“Come on,” House says, getting to his feet. He leans heavily against his cane, the way he did after he sat still for a while. “I’ll get you out of here, and you can bug me about it at home.”

“You have work,” Wilson protests. House just shrugs.

“I can deal with Cuddy,” he says mildly. He could, and would, too.


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> little aside - i did some cancer research for this one, primarily on symptoms involving fatigue and pain, and i just wanted to say that if you or anyone you love is dealing with this terrible illness, my heart goes out to you. hug your loved ones, guys. it could all be over tomorrow

At home, they’re intertwined, to a frankly ridiculous degree. Once, this had been House’s apartment, but in one-year-six-months-five-days of officially being – well, House called them “partners”, when the subject arose, and he had to say something more mature than “butt-buddies”. And “boyfriends” made Wilson feel like a seventh grader; if seventh grade Jimmy wasn’t so deep in the closet he was finding Narnia.

Since they were officially _together_ , for simplicity’s sake. In a year and change of being together, things had stopped being _House_ or _Wilson,_ and had started being a muddy blur of _HouseandWilson, WilsonandHouse._

Even with his wives he had never been this bad – up House’s ass during any waking hour they were both at home. He truly just couldn’t seem to stop himself. Whether it was sitting House’s lap to watch a movie or stealing a bite of whatever he was eating right off his fork or bothering him while he was trying to tune one of his many instruments. Wilson didn’t even have the appetite for real food anymore, but he’d take it anyway, just for House to tut and ask him if he thought he was Criss Angel.

_“And if you do,”_ he’d say, softly and with no venom, because even his snark is tame these days. “ _I want my money back.”_

It was a damn good thing House didn’t mind – Wilson knew how annoying he was. And from how House easily opened his arms for Wilson to squish into, one could even say he encouraged it.

And it would have been fine if it were just the touching. If they were fumbling around like dumbass kids under the bleachers, there might be no cause for concern. But no. The muddle of _WilsonHouse_ was everywhere, from the ugly mismatch of flatware they both owned, to there only being one brand of shampoo in the shower (Wilson had eventually given in trying to get House to buy his own).

They were a _couple:_ two people, but also a unit. It had gotten to the point that when they were invited to things, it was never individually. Hospital gossip rivalled most high schools – everyone knew who was in bed with who, and they sent their e-vites accordingly. There were two toothbrushes in the holder, for God’s sake. Two razors in the cabinet.

And one bed in the bedroom.

Wilson didn’t know what to do with it all, frankly. He was smitten – he would be lying if he said he wasn’t smitten. And House obviously was pretty pleased, too. They were really like parasites, if a parasite could have a parasite of its own.

They lived under each other’s skin. They knew each other way, way too well, just from the sheer amount of years of being in the same proximity. They were, quite literally, symbiotic – House had grown in Wilson’s roots. And Wilson had nothing to compare it to – he had never had any relationship as long; romantic or otherwise.

And that was the truth of it, the real core of the matter. He couldn’t _not_ love House – he had known him too long. If he wasn’t supposed to love House, he would have walked away a long time ago. Because despite how badly he was at choosing who to saddle up with, Wilson knew when it was time to abandon ship.

With House, there _was_ no ship to abandon. House was the island, and Wilson was the adrift sailor. With House, he always had somewhere – someone – to call his own.

House unlocks the door to their apartment, nudges it open with the butt of his cane. “Honey, I’m home.”

“I think I have to be inside for you to use that one,” Wilson says, brushing past House. He needs a shower _now._ He doesn’t care what happens after, only hopes it involves sleep, at some point.

_What do cancer patients, the elderly, and newborns have in common… always tired! Hahaha._

God, the cancer must have gotten to his funny bone, too.

“You want food?” House is asking, shutting the door. He drops his keys onto their hook – the little stick-on key hook they had bickered about because it was “ugly”, but had probably saved House a million seconds of key-searching by now.

“Not tonight,” Wilson answers honestly, and House looks up, surprised.

“What’d you eat today?” he asks suspiciously.

Wilson frowns. “Don’t mother me.”

“You asked me the exact same question earlier!”

“Don’t _pity_ me, then.”

“I don’t pity you, asshole, I love you!”

And that stops the conversation cold, because House didn’t do “I love you”s. Wilson did, and did often, and had learned not to be offended when House didn’t reciprocate. He loved his emotionally stunted bastard, as frustrating as he was.

“I know you do,” Wilson says. The tension drops immediately. Time was valuable – they were both learning not to waste it. “I love you, too.”

“Sorry,” House blurts, and Wilson tries to take it in stride. Apologies are a strange thing to get used to, but he was. He hadn’t even realized they’d been missing until they started popping up.

“Me too,” Wilson whispers. “I had cereal, earlier. Just one of those days, you know. Can’t take a bunch of chemicals up the arm without losing something.”

Wilson had been hovering at the edge of the kitchen, with House circling in the middle like a mid-sized apartment shark. He was a busy body, had a hard time sitting still, and fidgeted if he really had to stay seated. Wilson grabs him mid-stride and kisses him. He can’t remember if they’ve done that today.

“Sorry,” House says against his mouth. Wilson’s eyes are closed, so he can’t tell, but it sounds like House might be a little choked up.

“S’okay,” Wilson murmurs. He touches House’s upper thigh, and opens his eyes to House’s neutral, if slightly pinched, expression. The moment, whatever it may have been, passed. “Your leg okay?”

“Peachy,” House says, patting Wilson’s hand. “A Vicodin sandwich would make it all better, though.”

“I know,” Wilson says softly, and he did. It wasn’t just empathy – he had been with House through the entire withdrawal mess. The vomiting, the crying, the pleading. It had been ugly, as addiction often was, but it gave him the kind of perspective where he could go ‘I know’, and House couldn’t tell him otherwise.

He rests his head against House’s chest, forehead against his collarbone. He smells like cheap deodorant and the sun, like he’d been outside. Wilson sighs.

“Needa shower,” he mumbles, though he would really like to stay right here, somehow sleep standing up like horses do, his head against House’s collarbone.

“Go,” House says. “Make you feel better.”

“I feel fine,” Wilson protests, because okay, sure, he wasn’t hungry, but today had been fine. Really, he was okay – not just saying it. “They’re saying saline is the cure, now.”

“Yeah, whatever,” House mutters, but he’s just slightly smiling. “Go. Shoo, fly.”

And when he’s finished showering, House is washing the dishes from his dinner-for-one, because he found it rude to eat around someone who couldn’t. Of all the things for House to find rude, Wilson wouldn’t have expected that, but he appreciated it all the same.

“I’ll marry you,” he says, because he’s concluded that they were already married. If House wanted a piece of paper to sit pretty in their living room and a ring to fiddle with – fine. Wilson is happy to give him that, even if the thought of his mother watching him kiss another man makes his soul temporarily leave his body.

Imagine the shock. _Hey everybody – it’s James, hi. Getting married again, but this time… to a man! Surprise!_

“You’ll civil-union me?” House corrects. “It’s not legal, in this state, and I doubt you want to leave Jersey.”

“I’ll civil-union you, then,” Wilson says firmly. He runs his fingers through his wet hair, where he knows it will curl and be a mess later. He’s tired – doesn’t care. “For now – take me to bed?”

“Always, dear,” House says, taking Wilson’s hand. If he’d been able, Wilson thinks he might have swept him off his feet.


	3. Chapter 3

The state of New Jersey could call their union whatever it wanted – but this was a fucking wedding.

It immediately feels like _too much,_ even though it’s just a small gathering of friends and family. It’s nice, though – Wilson hadn’t had much hand in the planning, but things had fallen together quickly. Wilson didn’t ask a stupid question like _why_ or try to do a stupid thing like get House to slow down. If anything, he probably worked better with a time constraint.

Gray and green are the colors, Wilson notices absently. He’s busy wiping his sweaty hands on his nice trousers – _God_ , he’s nervous. He had never been so nervous for his own wedding before.

It’s not a church. It’s… a venue, and Wilson can’t really place what else it could be used for, but it’s not a church. There is no religious imagery, Christian or otherwise, and Wilson finds himself glad for it. Not only was House the world’s biggest, meanest atheist, but Wilson didn’t really consider himself buddy-buddy with the Lord, either.

And there is the whole gay thing, of course.

Lisa Cuddy is standing at the end of the aisle, in a dark red dress that says she knows she has a nice body for her age. She’s smiling broadly, stupidly, like she had known this is where they would end up all along. Wilson doesn’t wonder why she’s ordained – all doctors had their hobbies. His happened to be House.

House’s side of the aisle contains no family. Thirteen is also smiling stupidly, grinning ear to ear. It looked like Taub was already crying – and very much acting like he wasn’t. Foreman just looks satisfied, and shit – did everybody assume they were going to get hitched, eventually? Wilson sure didn’t!

Wilson’s side is his mother, and whoever else she decided to bring. He doesn’t look, because the band has begun to play, and that’s his cue to emerge from the wings.

He’s so nervous, he nearly trips over his own two feet. And then House is there, laughing at him, blue eyes sparkling as he looks him over. Then Wilson is smiling stupidly, too.

Wilson knows he looks alright, in his new gray suit and tie. But House –

House was stunning. He very rarely wore suits, and when he did, it was for one of their stuffy medical galas, and he was miserable the whole time. But this – Wilson had never seen House clean up like this, not ever. Hair slicked back, shoes shined, tie the same green as the wedding color. Even his cane has been polished.

And he’s grinning, really grinning, like the cat who got the cream. He’s pleased beyond pleased, and it’s infectious.

“Hi,” Wilson murmurs. He hadn’t seen House at all, except for this morning. It was the one traditional thing they’d kept intact.

He understands why, now. It’s like seeing him for the first time – but better than that, because it’s not the first time. It’s not the first, or the last – it’s one of many, many times Wilson had seen House’s face. And he’s still just as overjoyed to have the privilege.

“Hi,” House murmurs back.

A hush falls over the room as Cuddy begins to speak.

“Dearly beloved,” she says, voice smooth and sure.

House takes both his hands. Wilson’s heart is hammering out of his chest, and he doesn’t really know why. House gives him a grounding squeeze.

“We are gathered here today to witness the union of Gregory House and James Wilson…”

“So, you tamed House, huh?” Foreman leans over, taps his champagne glass to Wilson’s. “Mazel tov, man.”

“I don’t know about _tamed,”_ Wilson mutters, amused. He takes a sip, enjoying it – the champagne has a good bite. He doesn’t like the sweet stuff, and he supposed House knew that. “Thank you, though.”

“I’m happy for him,” Foreman says seriously. His eyes flash, remembering something. It occurs to Wilson that, despite House’s bitching, they had become good friends. Foreman gave a shit – not everybody did.

“He’s been down a bad road, before. I’m glad he won’t have to again.”

Wilson looks over at where House is talking to Cuddy and Thirteen, laughing about something over his own champagne glass. He catches Wilson’s gaze and holds it, mouth still moving with conversation, but all of his attention on Wilson. He grins.

Wilson can’t tear his eyes away. “Me too,” he tells Foreman. “Excuse me.”

He starts off towards House, only to be stopped midstride, his face grabbed and pulled down by his own mother. Her eyes are darkly frantic – he sees himself in them, much too clearly for his liking.

“Hi, Mom,” he says, greeting her reluctantly. “Why are you holding my face?”

He expects her to say something about the wedding, chide him for not coming to say hello to her. Or to comment about House – or even about marriage, and how he better not fuck up another one. What he doesn’t expect is –

“You have cancer?” she hisses, still holding his face. “You didn’t _tell me?”_

Oh, yeah. That. House must have gotten to talking with her, spilled the beans that Wilson had left to boil over.

“Yes, Mom, I have cancer,” Wilson says softly, only slightly annoyed. He knows he should have called – but it’s really not his favorite topic of conversation. _Hey, Mom, how are things at home? By the way, I’m dying._

“Stage three thymoma. Very tragic – we’ll talk all about it later. I have to go find my husband, now.”

She lets him go, as he knew the h-word would make her do. “I’m not happy with you, James,” she says.

“Yes, Mom, I know.”

Wilson turns on his heel, and, knowing House will follow, sneaks away from his own wedding reception.

He ends up under a cluster of trees at the far end of the property, sitting on his suit jacket and finishing off his champagne. He was worried he was going to be tired, today, or God forbid get sick. But he’s alright, if itching for an early bedtime.

He hears House before he sees him, as canes and soft grass don’t have the best relationship. House swears loudly and throws his cane over to Wilson’s spot, taking a few wobbly steps before plunking himself down.

“Hey,” he says. “You come here often?”

Wilson gives him a look before he kisses him – a real, full kiss with both his hands slotted against House’s cheeks. House licks his lips when they break, sighing.

“Is that a yes, then?”

“You’re insufferable,” Wilson says, laughing. He burrows into House’s side, House’s arm coming up around his back. If Wilson had to rank his favorite parts of being in a relationship, being held is pretty far up there.

“And you love me,” House says. Wilson notices, belatedly, that he’s lost both his jacket and tie. There is no tension in his body – he’s completely relaxed. “So what does that say about you?”

Wilson looks down at House’s shiny shoes, where his feet are nudged against Wilson’s own. They fit.

“That I’m stupid,” Wilson says. “I’m a dumb fucking idiot, that’s what it says about me.”

“Can I quote you on that?” House asks. Wilson jabs him between the ribs, and he laughs.

“Go ahead, asshole,” Wilson says. “Because you’re just as dumb.”

“No,” House protests, pressing a chaste little kiss to Wilson’s hairline. “I’m a genius. I got the grand prize, baby. I win.”

James Wilson dies on a Wednesday in October, four months after their wedding.

And it’s just a shitty day, too – blustery and cold, the promise of winter written in the shaking trees. Storm clouds threaten on the horizon.

House rolls over in bed, early in the morning, and Wilson isn’t breathing. He tries CPR, twice, but he isn’t stupid. Wilson has been dead for at least a few minutes. There’s nothing to be done.

And it’s so absurd, for Wilson to be dead, with his coffee cup on the table still holding dregs from the night before. With his shirts in the wash, ready to be folded. With so much more life to live.

Only three people attend the funeral, and that’s by design. House watches, numb, as his husband is lowered into the earth. He throws the first handful of dirt, and promptly leaves, telling Wilson’s mother to call him any time.

He thinks he’ll drink himself into oblivion, or maybe get his hands on some Vicodin. He doesn’t. Wilson had taught him better than that.

So he calls Thirteen, who is dying herself, and he cries to her on the phone. He could never do that with anyone else. Thirteen was special – she looked out for his stupid, stubborn ass like she had a page out of Wilson's playbook.

“I loved him,” he tells her, resting his head on his closed piano. “I don’t even like anybody – and I loved him.”

“You still do,” Thirteen says.

“What, you’re gonna quote the Bible to me? ‘ _Love never fails?’”_

“No,” Thirteen says softly. In the background, House can hear someone cooking dinner – presumably, her girlfriend. “Only that when you’ve been with someone as long as you and Wilson, it doesn’t go away. And I think you know that – you just wanted me to say it. Wilson didn’t leave you, House. He’s still there.”

“I love him so much,” House amends, and he does cry, then, with Thirteen’s quiet support on the other end.

Outside, splattering against the windows of their apartment, it had begun to rain.


End file.
